I was all set to write about the Liberals invoking time allocation on the Air Canada bill, when I saw this story and it pissed me right off: Thomas Mulcair thinks that the assisted dying bill needs to be referred to the Supreme Court to ensure that it meets the tests set out in the Carter decision. And it set me off, because this is completely ridiculous. The bill hasn’t even been debated yet, and already they want to demand that the Supreme Court start weighing in? Are you serious? Oh, but of course it’s serious – it’s part of this ongoing pattern of a lack of moral courage that MPs are oh so good at demonstrating, where they don’t want to be seen to have to make any tough decisions, so they fob it off onto the courts to do it for them. And here, before he’s even spoken to the bill in the Commons, he wants the court to do the heavy lifting for him. And it’s an endemic pattern. Usually, it involves the officers of parliament, for whom MPs have so successfully fobbed off all of their work that those officers are de facto the official opposition these days, holding the government to account and doing the heavy lifting because MPs won’t. Oh sure, they’re happy to make snide remarks and to manufacture a bunch of fake outrage in QP, but they won’t scrutinise estimates anymore, and barely scrutinise bills. Hell, their very first bill in this parliament got sent to the Senate in an incomplete form because they couldn’t be bothered to actually check it, but rather passed it at all stages in 20 minutes. And now they want the Supreme Court to do even more of that homework for them. And just like with other homework, where MPs use officers of parliament as their partisan shields (witness the number of questions in QP predicated with “The PBO says…”), Mulcair is looking to use the Supreme Court to do just that for this bill. Before it’s even had a minute of debate. Rather than just stand up and say “In my analysis, this bill doesn’t meet the Carter decision,” no, he needs to hide behind the Supreme Court so that it doesn’t look like the criticism is coming from him. That MPs do this is ridiculous and infantile. You’re elected to do a job – so actually grow up and do it.
Tag Archives: The Senate
Roundup: Freeing up some spots
The Senate bat-signal is calling me once more, and there’s plenty to discuss, starting with the fact that the Conservatives and Liberals have come to a decision about making space on the committees for “non-aligned” senators to get seats – likely two on each committee. It’s a tacit acknowledgment of the changes happening, and starts living up to a bit more fairness for the growing number of independent senators, but it’s not everything that it’s cracked up to be in part because this was a move made without consulting the Independent Working Group, which is organizing on behalf of seven of those independents (and may grow to include more as the new ones start getting their bearings). There were also 18 vacancies on committees, which this does fill. So it’s a good and welcome change, but there do seem to be a few questions around the process by which this happened.
Conservative and Liberal senators each give up a seat on committees for independent senators. #SenCA #cdnpoli pic.twitter.com/G4iI5IieVd
— Dale Smith (@journo_dale) April 18, 2016
As for Senator Harder’s budget request, I’m still having a hard time buying it. As he explained, he’s looking to hire a chief of staff (I’m dubious why), a senior policy advisor (okay), a director of communications (sure), three legislative assistants (three sounds like an awful lot), a director of parliamentary affairs (again, a bit dubious), plus an executive assistant and an assistant (I’m not sure why he needs both). It’s not like he has a caucus to manage, even if he is liaising with all parties in the Senate. He went on Power & Politics to insist that this is just like the previous Government Leaders got – but he’s not the Government Leader. They explicitly made this whole distinction so that it was going to be different. He’s not a cabinet minister, so I’m not sure why he needs the same staff as a cabinet minister would. His file management is minimal in comparison, and he has not caucus to manage, legislative agenda of his own to carry out. He’s sheperding the government’s agenda, and possibly answering questions on their behalf in Senate QP, maybe (which we’re not entirely sure about yet, and even then, he still wouldn’t need that much staff for that task). I remain dubious in the face of the task at hand, and the government’s insistence that they’re doing things differently, rather than just putting a new label on the position and being too-cute-by-half about it.
Roundup: Harder’s budget request
Peter Harder is asking the Senate for a budget of $800,000 to hire nine people to assist in his “government representative duties.” While I’m not opposed to the dollar figure, I’m a bit curious about why nine staff, but let’s back up first to the precedent that is guiding this whole exercise, being Stephen Harper’s fit of pique when Marjory LeBreton resigned as Government Leader in the Senate. By that point, Harper was being badgered and hectored daily about the ClusterDuff incident, as well as Pamela Wallin and Patrick Brazeau, and he decided that his next Government Leader, Claude Carignan, was not going to be put into cabinet so as to give the appearance of distance. Of course, it was only the appearance, as Carignan was a minister in every respect but name, including being sworn into the Privy Council (necessary to get the briefing books to answer on behalf of the government in Senate QP). But because he wasn’t a minister, he couldn’t get funding from PCO for staff and needed activities, so Carignan went to the Senate and asked for a bigger budget, and he got it, hiring a staff of 14. With Trudeau now being fairly cute with the way he is handling the “government representative” file – Harder being sworn into Privy Council and able to attend cabinet meetings – the government decided that with the Carignan precedent, Harder can simply ask the Senate for the budget he needs. Now, he is getting some pushback about getting a budget without attendant responsibilities, such as answering in QP. They referred the decision to a subcommittee (that still hasn’t been filled), but I do wonder why nine. I can understand an admin staff, a policy person or two, a comms person, but without a caucus to manage, what exactly is so labour intensive about “shepherding the government’s agenda”? That’s a bit of time management, introducing the odd debate on government legislation, but what else would he be required to do? So perhaps we’ll get some answers, but it does seem a bit odd to me.
Roundup: Mulcair stands firm (for now)
The caucus meeting ran well overtime as Thomas Mulcair met with his MPs – assuming you call them “his” any longer, given the vote on Sunday – and when they did all finally emerge and faced the media, they put on a big show of solidarity, where they all got behind him in the Foyer. Mulcair announced that he was staying put for the time being, that they were united in this decision, and he was going to remain the caretaker until the new leader is chosen. Not that every MP felt quite the same, and perhaps none of them was more courageous than Don Davies, who bucked the trend of solidarity and it being unseemly to dissent in public, who openly said that while they were united, it wasn’t uniform. And here we are – Mulcair continues to be abrasive and snide in QP, and probably will for the foreseeable future, since he no longer has to care about appealing to anyone as he is on the slow departure. Meanwhile, Jason Markusoff writes about the party’s existential crisis in the wake of the convention, while Paul Wells reminds us that the NDP has been in existential crisis for years. John Geddes writes that the party had pretty much found its new leader – Megan Leslie – but she doesn’t want the job, and it doesn’t look like she’ll be convinced otherwise. (I would of course add that while Leslie ticks most of the requisite boxes, she also lacks enough of a killer instinct for political leadership, which would likely hobble her eventually). So we shall see how this all transpires going forward, but for now, Mulcair is digging in for the long haul, whether his caucus likes it or not.
MP Don Davies says he expressed his position on Monday and that hasn't changed – ie would be difficult for Mulcair stay on for year & half.
— Laura Stone (@l_stone) April 13, 2016
"We're a democratic Party. Unity doesn't mean uniformity," MP Davies says. #NDP
— Laura Stone (@l_stone) April 13, 2016
Senate QP: Garneau in the hot seat
It was the first ministerial Senate QP with the advent of Peter Harder’s arrival as “government representative,” so it remained to be seen how this would change things. Senator Carignan started off, asking about rail safety, and more specifically around high-risk crossings. Garneau first thanked the senators for inviting him, before responding that the risk crossing database was a tool used by the department for investigative purposes and he was meeting with the Federation of Municipalities in a couple of weeks. Carignan asked further about the database, and Garneau explained some of the risk assessment measures related to it.
Roundup: Enter Peter Harder
Those seven new independent senators are now sworn in and installed, and it seems the Conservative spared no time in trying to insist that they were all secretly Liberal partisans, particularly the new “government representative,” Senator Peter Harder. In response to questions during a restored non-ministerial Senate QP, Harder said that he was recommended for appointment by the Institute for Research on Public Policy, and that he had no communication from the government about it. He also claimed he didn’t intend to be partisan, but be a kind of bureaucratic presence who could field questions on behalf of the government, while relaying concerns to cabinet on occasion. Harder also said that the new practice of bringing ministers to the chamber to answer questions would continue, and be expanded to 40 minutes, which is not a bad thing. What I am a bit more concerned about is the fact that Harder is talking about making amendments to the Parliament of Canada Act to start formalizing some of these changes that Trudeau has imposed on the Senate, but I’m not seeing much in the way of collaborating this with the other efforts to modernise the Senate’s operations. That this would be a discussion around the cabinet table and not involve senators themselves, based on Harder’s statements, is concerning because it does seem like meddling in the way the Senate operates – something Trudeau has already been doing with little regard for the consequences – despite the fact that none of them are in the Senate, particularly under this new regime. I don’t want to go so far as to say that he’s meddling in the Senate’s privilege, but it’s getting close to the line in some cases. The Senate is the institutional memory of parliament, and is supposed to have a longevity for a reason, which is why Harder insisting that it’s not unusual for governments to tinker with the Act to reflect stylistic preferences rubs me the wrong way. I also have some sympathy for the concern that “government representative” is a fairly American term that’s not really reflected in our Westminster traditions (though perhaps Australia’s “Washminster” system may find a more analogous term. We’ll see what Harder starts implementing soon enough, but I do retain a sense of scepticism.
Roundup: Fundraising moral panic
In case you missed it, the moral panic over the past week or so is ministerial fundraisers, first in Ontario (and to a certain extent BC), but that’s bled over in to the federal sphere, because apparently we were afraid of missing out. And don’t forget, the federal rules are already pretty strict, with corporate and union donations already been banned and the contribution limit is pretty small (and when it comes to leadership contests, the Conservatives and NDP conspired to screw the Liberals, who were mid-contest at the time, but that’s beside the point). The point is that there’s a lot of unnecessary tut-tutting, particularly around a perfectly legal private fundraiser that the Minister of Justice is holding at a Toronto law firm. “Oh,” they say. “Some of these lawyers may want to be judges one day.” And this is the point where I look at people who say that straight in the face and ask if they really think that a federal judicial appointment can be bought for $500. Really? Seriously? Even on the issue of legal contracts, the minister can recuse herself if said law firm bids. There are processes around this kind of thing. The Ethics Commissioner said that there is no apparent conflict of interest here, but that doesn’t stop people from crying “money for access!” And when you have people like Duff Conacher going on TV and decrying that limits should be $100 because that way it’s equal for everyone, you have to wonder if that logic extends to not everyone can have nice things, so we should ban them so that it’s fair for everyone. Also, if you lower the limit too low, then people start looking for other ways to raise money, and all you have to look to is Quebec, where their strict donation regime became quickly susceptible to corruption. Of course, Conacher won’t be satisfied by any ethics regime unless he’s in charge of the parliamentary thought police, and frankly, anyone who quotes him in one of these stories becomes suspect because it means they’re going for cheap outrage. Are there bigger problems of perception in places like Ontario, where there aren’t any donation limits? Yes, indeed. But that’s not the case federally, and the minister is following the rules. Frankly, I’m not fussed that the PM is shrugging this off because honestly, this isn’t something that we should be lighting our hair on fire about.
Senator Cowan talks about the move to independence
As the Senate moves into the Great Age of Independence™, Senate Liberal leader James Cowan reached out to talk more about where he’s at in terms of this move. We had a fairly wide-ranging conversation, elements of which are recorded here.
“It’s interesting to see how this thing is evolving now,” Cowan said. “I did have a meeting with [future] Senator Harder – he called when he was appointed. We had a very friendly lunch, but I didn’t get any sense from him as to exactly how he sees the universe unfolding.”
That of course remains a question as to whether anyone can see at this point. Cowan has noted that there have been efforts to reach out to some of the other independent senators in the Chamber, but he remains wedded to the notion that despite still being Liberals, they are independent as far as the Senate goes because they have no affiliation with the party or the Commons caucus.
Roundup: The Senate Advisory Board reports
In keeping with the commitment to openness and transparency, the Independent Advisory Board for Senate Appointments released their report yesterday (PDF) on the interim process by which the first seven of the new independent Senate appointments were chosen. It’s an interesting read – they had a list of nearly 300 names to consider after consultations and nominations, from which they whittled it down to 25 names – five per vacancy that they were expected to fill, from which Justin Trudeau ended up selecting seven names rather than just five. The cost of the whole process was about $170,000, which seems to be pretty bare bones if you ask me. There were observations on the process included in the report, primarily that the process was pretty rushed, which meant that most of the information they had on candidates were all based on self-declaration, and that they didn’t conduct interviews with their short-list candidates in this process – they merely identified them, and one presumes that PMO was then responsible for the final vetting – something that might change as the process goes forward and the panel has more time and resources going forward as they look to fill the remaining vacancies over the next year or so, and any future vacancies as they come up. Also, the report listed the nearly 400 groups that the Board reached out to in order to get suggestions, and had demographic data on gender, linguistic profile, and Aboriginal and visible minority status. It also noted that failed candidates got a letter thanking them for participation, and the report noted that they are free to apply again under the future process. The chair of the Board has dismissed any concerns over the issue of André Pratte and his property hiccough, given that it will be resolved before he is appointed, and it’s a perfectly reasonable position to take. I will also note that this report answers most of the questions that Scott Reid has been howling about in QP over the past couple of months with regard to process and the secrecy of the system. Yes, there is an expectation of confidentiality for those who did not get appointed, as with any Governor-in-Council appointment, and from the language of the report, the PM did indeed choose the names from those on the short lists. Thus far, it looks like this new system is working as expected, and it provides the necessary suggestions for how to improve the process even further. Of course, we need to see how these new senators will perform, particularly in the capacity as independents in a system where the rules are still weighted to party caucuses (though that is slowly changing), but so far Trudeau’s reform plans are bearing fruit. We just need time to evaluate them going forward before we can declare it a success or not.
Roundup: The casework distraction
Conservative immigration critic Michelle Rempel has sounded the alarm that the Liberals sound like they are about to cut off the special access for MPs’ offices to inquire about immigration files in favour of the directing their inquiries to the Ministerial Inquiry Division. Rempel’s concern is that this makes it harder for MPs to deal with immigration files on behalf of constituents – casework, as it is known. The department has thus far said there is no change, but in the event that there is, I’m actually not sure that this is such a bad idea. Why? Because, quite simply, this isn’t work that MPs should be doing. They shouldn’t be service providers on behalf of the public service, and I’ve heard from some staffers that the department won’t even start looking at files until the MP’s office forwards it to them, which is both appalling and a red flag that the system isn’t working the way it should be. An MP’s job is to hold the government to account, and to do so by controlling the public purse. Their staff should be focused on this work, and helping them with legislation as it happens. The expansion of the civil service, however, has prompted the development of MPs into ombudspersons for civil service interactions, which starts getting uncomfortable because it takes away from their actual roles. The fact that you have MPs who wind up dedicating staff to dealing entirely with immigration casework is quite simply wrong, and indicative of a system not working. Making immigration casework reliant upon MPs offices – no matter how non-partisan the work is – is a half-step away from a corrupt system where who you know is the determining factor for whether your files get looked at or not. It’s a civil service job to process files – not an MP’s job. If the Liberals are trying to clamp down on this abuse of process and focus on getting the department to do their jobs, while MPs to do theirs, I don’t actually see the problem with that. It’s how things should work, and if they’re trying to right that particular ship, then all the power to them. MPs should be focusing on their actual work, which let’s face it – most of them don’t, because they don’t actually know what their job is (see: crisis of civic literacy in this country). If the government of the day takes away from their distractions (work that they actually shouldn’t be doing), then maybe we can hope that it’ll help steer their attention back toward the work they should be. But maybe I’m being a wildly optimistic dreamer again.
https://twitter.com/markdjarvis/status/717130956398682113
https://twitter.com/ldobsonhughes/status/717139036670992388
.@MichelleRempel Minister's office tells me this is not true. MPs won't have to call the general number. pic.twitter.com/cxeLT0JSDu
— Althia Raj (@althiaraj) April 5, 2016